Courtney’s Opinion: I think we’re destined to become our parents in some sense.
Shortly after we buried my father’s ashes in New Jersey, the media began reporting a series of nightly lights illuminating the North Jersey skies. Sure, it could have been the glow of the Budweiser factory bouncing off the Newark Airport tower. I am not saying it was my dad, but I am not saying it wasn’t. If you believe in signs, you might agree.
The morning of my father-in-law’s funeral, four years prior, I went for a run to clear my head. As I stepped outside, a cardinal appeared and continued to show up during my three-mile route. Most mornings since, a cardinal has greeted me as I open the garage door.
My father’s backyard was a bird sanctuary full of bird feeders and a birdbath. His garage was piled high with Amazon boxes of birdseed. We brought the birdbath to our backyard and set it beneath our 40-foot magnolia.
The tree was leveled, by a pine twice its size, during Hurricane Helene. Somehow the birdbath survived unscathed. One week after Helene, when we arrived home from my father’s funeral, two cardinals were sitting together in the birdbath. We like to believe that my dad, Don, and my father-in-law, Arthur, are hanging out together in our backyard. We now have bird feeders in the backyard and a stockpile of birdseed in the garage. I have become my father.
Growing up, Florence and Jim were the “old people” across the street. They were probably no older than I am now, but they weren’t cool and hip like me and would yell if our soccer ball landed in their yard. I still have dreams about playing in the street and having to go into their yard. The nightmare usually ends with me falling into the lagoon that neighbored their lot. More fodder for my therapist I am sure, but I suspect Florence and Jim’s kids are yelling at their neighbors’ kids as I type.
I think we’re destined to become our parents in some sense.
I am mostly looking forward to that point when I no longer need to keep my edit button in check – when I can say whatever I want, with no repercussions, because I am old. All of the “not at the dinner table” topics that were once taboo will be fully in play. My mother is good for at least one round of politics at all family gatherings and a smattering of POA smack. I can feel it coming.
Last night, my husband and I went to The Jazz Corner for dinner. When we arrived, there was a party of eight crowding the sidewalk outside the entryway. Before sliding past them, I leaned in and asked, “Have you checked in already?” to which the matriarch of the group replied, “Why is she asking me, like I am the expert here?” I made knowing eye contact with her daughter, who appeared to be about my age, and said, “No. I am asking you because you are blocking the entire entrance.” That is exactly what my mom would have said. I am her. She is me.
Just this morning I was working out, trying to calculate my reps, and forgot my multiplication tables. For the life of me I couldn’t remember what the sum of nine times six was. I panicked and thought, I am turning into my mother – because certainly she doesn’t recall that she tells the same POA story at every family dinner – and forgetting things is my fate.
Last year, I traveled with my niece, Erin. Our flight was grounded by an ice storm in St. Louis and we subsequently spent eight hours together in the Delta lounge in Atlanta. When we finally got home, she told her mother it was one of her favorite trips, because “Me and Aunt Courtney are basically the same person.” I’m sorry, Erin, but yes, soon, you too will become us.
Note to the reader: We ran out of time to take new photos of Barry and Courtney before deadline, so this is a photo of two random kids from our stock photo site. Enjoy!
Barry’s Opinion: When and How Do We Become Our Parents?
One of the challenges of writing this column – which you’ll recall was once a debate format – is that Courtney and I actually agree on quite a bit. For example, we had originally talked about framing this column around the bizarre lights that have been showing up in the night sky lately. I thought that might be something Courtney could get into since, like those lights, she comes from New Jersey by way of Jupiter.
Turns out we’re both convinced that the aliens have arrived and it’s time to take up arms (at least I think she said that. I wasn’t really paying attention when she responded). But then, Courtney posed a question whose very conceit was so bafflingly alien to me that I’m now convinced the real UFO was the cowriters we met along the way.
“At what age do we become our parents?” she asked.
Until she asked that, I was unaware that this was an option. I share some traits with my parents, sure, but “becoming” them?
Bill and Linda Kaufman were responsible, respectable people at my age. As they mellowed into their 40s, they did things like saving for retirement and understanding how taxes work. I drive a bright yellow moped I bought on impulse and write stuff like this for a living. I’m sure I’ve paid taxes at some point, but God only knows to whom.
Sure, there have been a few moments in the past few years when the icy hand of maturity has tightened its grip on me. I recently read not just one but three novels about World War II. I can no longer hear the buzz that electronics make when left on, but I can damn sure tell when a light has been left on in the house.
Just this past week, I watched PBS. And I ENJOYED IT.
It’s not always a guarantee that you’ll become your parents. After all, you don’t live in the world they did. My junior year of college, two planes took out the World Trade Center and ever since, my entire adulthood has been one crisis after another. The dot com bubble. The great recession. Endless wars overseas. The housing bubble. COVID. Social media misinformation.
When they were in their 40s, my parents were dealing with … (checks notes) … the looming threat of more Rocky sequels. OK, so we were all dancing on the brink of nuclear annihilation, but when aren’t we? The point is, my parents and I are not experiencing the same world, and it has molded us into very different kinds of adults.
I imagine it will be the same for my kids. Maybe they won’t be jumping from crisis to crisis as they enter their 40s but I’m not exactly holding out hope. All I can do is hope that I’ve done the one thing I do feel like I share with my parents: the willingness to prepare their children for anything. In good times, it means keeping a tidy house, a healthy stock portfolio, and a positive outlook. In times like these, it means hopping on the moped and getting ready for the alien invasion.
Good luck, kids!
